The invention relates to a plant for producing chocolate articles, comprising at least one refrigeration section.
Apart from numerous other sections, conventional plants inter alia always also comprise one or several refrigeration sections. These refrigeration sections serve the purpose of cooling the chocolate or the chocolate filling. In the case of plants for producing chocolate, known from the state of the art, each refrigeration section has a refrigeration unit, comprising a refrigeration element, a fan and optionally a respective refrigerant processing plant. This traditional allocation of a refrigeration unit to a refrigeration section is problematic from various aspects. For example, the individual refrigeration units can often not ensure adequate dryness and coldness of the refrigerated air, because if they did the expenditure in relation to the refrigeration unit would be excessive. Cooling air containing too much moisture results in components within the cooling section corroding more quickly or results in unintended build-up of micro-organisms. A further problem in the case of the known refrigeration units, each with one refrigeration unit allocated, is that they necessitate expensive cold-air temperature control. As a rule, in the case of known refrigeration units, temperature control is by way of air temperature reading prior to air entering the heat exchanger. Such a temperature control provides only for average temperature setting accuracy. The known refrigeration units have a further problem in that the pressure differential generated in the cooling section, assisted by said refrigeration units, causes an influx of non-refrigerated secondary air through leakages in the refrigeration section. This too reduces the effectiveness of the refrigeration units.
Based on the problems outlined above, it is the object of the present invention to provide a plant for producing chocolate articles which ensures significantly improved cooling of the refrigeration section.